In Montana, ranchers line up against coal

So even though people may be complaining about coal development and how dirty rotten bad it is, it pays a lot of bills in the state of Montana.

Out in these windy stretches of cottonwood and prairie grass, not far from where Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer ran into problems at Little Bighorn, a new battle is unfolding over what future energy development in the West will look like.

Here, rancher Wallace McRae and his son, Clint, run cattle on 31,000 acres along Rosebud Creek, land their family has patrolled with horses and tamed with fences for 125 years.

They could probably go on undisturbed for 100 years more if the earth under the pastures weren't laced with coal. A consortium led by BNSF Railway Co. wants to build a rail line to carry some of that coal to market. Nine miles of it would run through the McRae ranch.